Caro confirms what I have felt for years. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 would not have passed when they did were it not for the political acumen of LBJ. As much as I despised him in the 1960s and 70s, he knew how Washington worked and how to get legislation through the Congress and on to the president's desk. Kennedy had to neutralize him as much as possible in 1960, thus his choice of Johnson as VP. This is a great analysis of this part of Johnson's life. Like most readers who have read the three preceding volumes of Robert Caro's THE YEARS OF LYNDON JOHNSON, I have eagerly awaited this installment, for it covers not only the most dramatic events in Johnson's career, but one of the most dramatic, as well as mythic, eras in American history. THE PASSAGE OF POWER is the story of LBJ's passage from Senate Majority Leader to the Presidency itself by way the Vice Presidency under John F. Kennedy. At over 700 pages, Caro's book offers a wealth of detail, including incisive character portraits of other players in the drama of the Kennedy years, along with some long overdue corrections to the historical record. Light reading this is not, but THE PASSAGE OF POWER is a must read for even the most casual student of 20th Century American history.The first arc of the book covers the 1960 campaign, and Johnson's abortive Presidential run. He thought his powerful position in the Senate would translate into support from fellow Democrats at the grass roots, and it might have worked, if-according to Caro-Johnson had not drug his feet about jumping in out of fear of failure until the Kennedy campaign had all but locked the nomination up in time for the convention in Los Angeles. He went into the convention with a solid block of support from the Old South and his native Texas, but not much else. It was not nearly enough to deny JFK a first ballot nomination, but it made Johnson an attractive choice for the second spot on the ticket.Why did Johnson give up his powerful job as Senate Majority Leader and accept the number two spot on the ticket with the junior Senator from Massachusetts? Caro has done his research well and gives a riveting account of the back and forth that went on during the day Johnson was picked, and the best answer seems to be that LBJ was willing to take a gamble that the road to power on a national scale in the 1960's did not include staying in the Senate and representing Texas. And he thought he could turn the Vice Presidency into a powerful office just by having himself in it-in this he was quickly proved wrong. But Caro makes an utterly irrefutable case that Johnson's efforts to hold the South for the Democratic ticket in 1960 was an essential component of Kennedy's victory; there would have been no Camelot if it had not been for "Rufus Cornpone" campaigning in Dixie (not to mention some ballot stuffing in Texas). Johnson's contributions were ignored by Theodore White, but Caro makes up for it here.Although Caro's portrait of the conniving and over bearing Johnson in the previous books made him less than sympathetic (to say the least), one cannot help but feel his discomfort in the role of Vice President to JFK, where he had no power more than what the Constitution or the President allowed him. He had to contend with the condescension, if not outright contempt, of the President's inner circle, led by the President's brother and Attorney General, Robert F. Kennedy. RFK despised Johnson and the feeling was mutual, especially after Bobby Kennedy's repeated attempts to talk Johnson out of taking the Vice Presidency at the convention. Caro makes it clear that the sidelining of Johnson was a mistake and how his advice and help would have been most valuable when it came to the administration's dealings with Congress, especially on framing a strategy to get the Civil Rights Act past determined Southern opposition.The center of the book concerns the events of November 22nd, 1963 in Dallas; here Caro gives one of the most intense accounts of what happened ever written from Johnson's point of view: the landing at the airport, the motorcade, the shots in Dealey Plaza, the wait for news at Parkland Hospital, the swearing in on Air Force One. All of this has been covered in countless other books, but few, if any of them, will surpass what Caro does here. And he goes on to recount some of the controversies of those tragic days and refute some of the accounts by loyal Kennedy aides that LBJ was insensitive and ham handed in taking over the office of President. If the Warren Commission was a mistake, it didn't seem so during the last days of November, 1963, when Lee Harvey Oswald's Soviet and Cuban connections left many people convinced he was part of a foreign conspiracy.The last section of the book concerns the immediate days and months after the assassination, when Johnson at last reached the summit of power he had so long desired and worked to obtain. Caro's theme here is that this man, who could be by turns pushy, grasping, cruel, bullying, wheedling and conniving to get what he wanted and further his ambitions, nevertheless hit all the right notes during and after one of the most traumatic public tragedies in American history. He stayed out of the spotlight during the funeral, did not insist on working out of Kennedy's Oval Office, instead Johnson retreated to his Vice President's office in Executive Office Building and worked the phone night and day. And when the time came to step forward and address a joint session of Congress days after Dallas, he found the right words and delivered them in a way that solidified support for the new administration in the country.In the aftermath to the tragedy in Dallas, Johnson would use whatever tool he could lay his hands on to break the legislative logjam in Congress and get Kennedy's program moving again, especially the Civil Rights Act; in this he had spectacular success. Kennedy'd acolytes would later claim he would have accomplished all that Johnson achieved had he lived, but Caro makes a most convincing case that on the morning of November 22nd, 1963, JFK's programs was dead in the water in both house of Congress with little chance that things would change anytime soon. Only days after Johnson succession to the Presidency, Senator Richard Russell of Georgia, the South's General in the battle to perserve segregation, confessed to an aide that Kennedy would never have gotrwn the Civil Rights Act passed, but Johnson absolutely would succeed and make it the law of the land.Senator Russell is among many fascinating secondary characters who appear in the narrative; chief among them is Bobby Kennedy, relentless and driven where his brother was charming and witty; the junior Kennedy brother emerges as Johnson's #1 antagonist, a rift which would make both men bitter enemies over time. There is Virginia Senator Harry F. Byrd, the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, the man to see when the President wanted a budget or a tax cut passed; a man who wields great power in the 1960's, but whose values and outlook would have been much more at home in the 1860's. There is a poignant portrait of Theodore Sorenson, one of JFK's most loyal men and the grief he bore in the days after Dallas as he tried to serve a new President.One thing I did take from this book is how badly short changed was the historical record when both John and Robert Kennedy died before they could write definitive memoirs covering their days in power. Who wouldn't want to hear a detailed account by JFK as to why he picked Johnson as a running mate, and would he have really kept him on the ticket in 1964 despite the Bobby Baker scandal and embarrassing news stories of how Johnson acquired his fortune during his years in Congress.What Robert Caro does so effectively in THE PASSAGE TO POWER is to remind Americans that Lyndon Johnson was much more than a character out of HOUSE OF CARDS; yes, he ruthlessly and obsessively sought power over a career spanning decades, but once he achieved his goal, he actually did something positive with it.Near the end of the book, Caro gives and account of a huge barbecue, held by the Johnson's on their ranch over the Christmas holidays of 1963, it is quite the contrast to the elegant affairs put on by the Kennedys; it was covered very favorably by the press at the time, but we know that Johnson's raucous Texas ways would eventually wear out its welcome with the American public as the struggle over civil rights turned violent in the years ahead with riots tearing apart cities, not to mention the searing rift over Vietnam that will divide the country like nothing since the Civil War. But that is a story for the next volume in this series, one that Robert Caro will, no doubt, tell very well.
What do You think about Passage Of Power, The (2012)?
The utterly fascinating story of Lyndon Johnson's defeat and subordination to John F. Kennedy, his exile in the wilderness of the vice Presidency, his actions on that fateful day in Dallas (with profound insight into Johnson's psychology on that day including his brash and insensitive treatment of the Kennedy family and Jackie on Air Force One as it left Dallas), his assumption of the Presidency, and the shocking efficiency with which he assumed power and passed The Civil Rights Act. The CRA story itself is worth the reading, as it required a herculean effort that few politicians could accomplish other than Johnson, but the entirety of the book is compelling and fascinating. The political story of Johnson is indeed a microcosm of our time and our political system, and Caro is the right chronicler for the time - one assumes the next volume will document the fall of Johnson via Vietnam, but it will be several years before it emerges.
—Poori
The utterly fascinating story of Lyndon Johnson's defeat and subordination to John F. Kennedy, his exile in the wilderness of the vice Presidency, his actions on that fateful day in Dallas (with profound insight into Johnson's psychology on that day including his brash and insensitive treatment of the Kennedy family and Jackie on Air Force One as it left Dallas), his assumption of the Presidency, and the shocking efficiency with which he assumed power and passed The Civil Rights Act. The CRA story itself is worth the reading, as it required a herculean effort that few politicians could accomplish other than Johnson, but the entirety of the book is compelling and fascinating. The political story of Johnson is indeed a microcosm of our time and our political system, and Caro is the right chronicler for the time - one assumes the next volume will document the fall of Johnson via Vietnam, but it will be several years before it emerges.
—Pissy101
This is the first Caro book I have read about LBJ. Very readable. Great history book.
—Autumn_Rae
He really is the Edward Gibbon of our time! I cannot wait for the next installment!
—asasas
